Yuta was filming a movie in Korea so he was staying at a hotel near the production building for better access. They were filming a war related scene, he was one of the soldiers. To be cast as that meant he would often get dirty, and learned a thing or two on how to act, he understood a lot more, not enough though. He thought it was nice to experience something new like this, especially if it involved the real world and it gave him more knowledge without actually being involved in it.
“Makeup team! Yuta has arrived, get to it please!”
Yuta placed his bag aside, before plopping himself in the chair. Traveling was extremely tiring, so was acting in general for long months without being able to be with family. His family remained back in Japan, where they still thoroughly supported him by sending him gifts, video-chatting him when he had the time, and associating with them everyday. It was a true bliss not everyone could have to own a supportive family, which is why was was internally and externally grateful for them. As the lady smeared mud on his cheek, then wiping it off to make it appear seem dry, his phone began to ring.
“Give me a moment.”
Yuta apologized and walked to the corner of the room to answer the call, it was his mother.
“Hello?”
”Son, have you seen the news? Are you safe? I’ve heard it began in Korea.”
”What has? What are you speaking about?”
“Yuta, son, remain indoors. There is something going around, a virus, apparently it started where you are, in Korea, but has been seen here in Japan also. I’ve seen it. Folks have been eating each other! It sounds fake, but people have been evacuating their houses and leaving.”
Then there was a scream. Yuta turned around, walking from the makeup corner to the set where one of the actors was acting strange.
“What was that?”
“Mom..”
The actor tackled another person part of the cast, scratching at his chest until he ripped through the fabric and the skin. They screamed as they were torn apart, their insides being ripped out of his chest and eaten intensely.
“It’s here.”
Yuta hurriedly directed the girls and the cast outside to escape, while the thing continued to eat. He locked other doors that people could possibly come through and boarded it up, but when he turned around after moving a chair, it was a few steps away from him. He grabbed back onto the chair, waited a few seconds for it to come closer before lifting the chair and crashed it into its shoulder. He quickly left the building after before it could get back up, he noticed he was still on the call and held his phone to his ear.
“Mom?”
“Son.. don’t blame your sister..”
Yuta heard a gargling noise then the sound of his poor mother throwing up on the other side of the line.
“What happened? Mom, what did she do?”
“Forgive her, please, she never meant to. She isn’t feeling well right now, she doesn’t know what she is doing. I’m sorry. I should have protected her, right?”
“Mom.. where is she?”
“Oh, she's here.. here with me.”
“Please, get away from her.”
“It’s too late son. But please remember this, if this continues to spread, don’t let your heart fill with hatred. Continue to feed it with hope and optimism like you always do, you have made me so proud from how you grew up to be such a wonderful man. When you survive, marry a kind woman. Or a kind man. I hope he or she.. makes you happy.. just as you make me so so happy.”
After she finished speaking, groans replaced her words and shrieks. Yuta couldn’t bear to hear it, and hung up. His mother and sister were dead. No doubt if they were, so were the rest of his family. As much as he wanted to cry until his face was red and sore, he didn’t have the time to and ran to where his car was. He needed to go back to the hotel, if it had spread here like his mother assumed, he should barricade himself until it dies down. Perhaps he should give a fellow friend a call for help. Yuta noticed the roads were normal, so he drove like every other day and at the speed limit, or around it. The silence and sounds of people talking went on naturally. If that one staff was infected from the production building, then it must be taking over the entire facility right now. The thought shook him up and a chill danced down his spine, then he heard a screech of a car and saw a white car wildly drive past him until it crashed into a convenience store. With a woman stuck underneath. Yuta predicted what happened, and didn’t want to be in the middle of the inevitable, the chaos would soon happen so the speed limit didn’t matter. His hotel wasn’t far from where the crash was, which worried him. Once he arrived, people were pooling out already and thought there would be no time to go up the stairs or elevator without being trampled or slowed down by others.
The hotel was modern, beautiful really. In the front there were large cubes stacked on top of each other, there were three that were each attached to each other. Yuta drove his car near one, and got out only to stand on top of his head, then jump with his hands grabbing onto the edge. With a grunt, he pulled himself up and stood upon the people, watching everything unravel like the strands of a sweater. He realized he didn’t have the time, and walked across until he found the apartment rooms with a balcony. Yuta stepped back, before running and landing into the inside of it. As he stepped in, he counted the floors below him. He was on the third, his room was on the fifth. When he entered the room, it was abandoned and he saw the hallways were filled with people still scrambling to leave and shoving into each other like it was every man for himself. Many of them seemingly believed in that. Yuta assumed the only way up, was to jump more and higher for the sake of entering his apartment. He found a stool and set it outside, accidentally hitting his head at first and rubbing his aching head. Then he jumped and his arms held onto the balcony rail, gasping out of fright and looked down, if he fell he would certainly break a few bones and crack his head open which will lead to his death.
Again, he manages to pull his body upwards and swing his leg over the rail, then falling onto his back. The room was left a mess with clothes and other essentials scattered, it seems they were definitely in a rush. When Yuta opened the door, it wasn’t as crowded and he slipped past them to make it up the stairs instead of those going down, but once he made it to his room he realized something. He forgot his bag in the production building. He couldn’t possibly go back now, with all he went through to make it up there. So, he stepped back until he felt the wall connect to his back, before running and ramming his shoulder into the door. It didn’t open. After doing it twice, he saw the cracks at the edges of the door begin to stick out, then with the fourth try there was a hole. Yuta held the doorframe and shoved his foot around the opening, where he continued until it was big enough for him to squeeze himself in. At last, he was in his apartment.
He searched for anything that would be useful in a fight. When he saw a knife in a kitchen, he remembered something in the past his father had gifted him, which earned a scolding from his mother.
“Son, you know how there is tons of bad people in the world?”
The elder man asked his seven year old son who laid on the grass with his eyes gazing at the clouds. He turned his head to look at his father, where he nodded.
“Well, I wouldn’t want my son to become older and not know how to defend himself if any criminals decided to mess with you. I bought you something that would be useful, but only use it in self-defense okay! Never be a bad person.”
Yuta sat up and immediately nodded with a determined and serious expression, which earned a chuckle out of his father.
”Good good. I know you will do great things in the future, people will look at you in adoration and love in their eyes. You will be known.”
His father then pulled out a box from behind him that had been waiting, sitting on the grass until it was picked up. He opened the black box where the inside was red, and a trench knife laid delicately placed above a cloth. Yuta awe’d in admiration, the blade and handle were a spotless black, it would be a situation if he was walking in the dark and the knife was on the floor.
“Keep it safe.. from your mother. She’ll kill me.”
He remembered seeing his laughing face after, and when his mother found out he was trying to keep it from revealing he found it purely hilarious. Yuta pulled the suitcase from beneath the bed, popping it open and finding the same little box from years ago stuffed between his clothes. He always brought it with him when he traveled. He knew this wouldn’t be enough though, considering his lack of skills and it meant he would have to be close to it. He needed a gun. Thankfully, Yuta knew a special man who would have more than one. More than a single person should have, really.
Yuta pulled out his phone and searched for his contact, it read Kun, the last sent text was not too long ago. He was a business man who didn’t have the time to contact his friends or family consistently, he lived here in Korea so he thought he would make his way around. Yuta though didn’t know where he was and if the virus had traveled there, if not it would be there soon, so if they were to have a hideout, a nine-story apartment wouldn’t be so bad. He pressed his finger against the telephone icon. It answered after a few rings.
“What do you want hyung?”
“Hello to you too, I understand if you’re busy–”
“Busy? Busy trying to keep myself alive, hell yea I’m busy.”
“So I assume it’s where you are too, my mother said it started in Japan, and it was already here in Korea. Listen, I’m–”
“You never told me you were here.”
Yuta heard the sound of wheels screeching, he must be in a car.
“Good though. Tell me where you are, you must be staying in a stable apartment. I could already guess where you are going with this, you want to form a little get-together and you don’t have any guns. And here we are. Don’t worry,”
Kun looked in the backseat, where splattered blood was slapped onto the seats but also his open luggage. Inside were enough guns for more or less ten people. He stared at the blood for a few seconds before focusing back on the road. It was a life or death situation and didn’t have time to become infected.
“I got you hyung, so where are you? I hope you aren’t far.”
After Yuta told him the address, he hung up, exhaling a big sigh. He truly was thankful he had someone like Kun. Yuta had already explained which floor and room he was on, that there was a hole in it and he wouldn’t miss it. For now, he would wait for his arrival. But around fifteen minutes later, he heard a scream and stood up, startled with his fingers in the trench knife handle. Then the door open suddenly.
“Kun?”
A/n : Kun ain't going to be the sweetheart (like he is irl) here.